Judge tosses telecom wiretap suits

SAN FRANCISCO, June 4 (UPI) -- A federal judge tossed out more than three dozen lawsuits claiming major U.S. telecom companies illegally participated in warrantless wiretapping programs.

Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker of the U.S. District Court in Northern California said that while consumer and privacy advocacy groups raised important constitutional issues in their claims, Congress was clear about its "unequivocal intention" when it passed a bill last year that gave immunity to phone carriers in the wiretapping program, The New York Times reported Thursday.

The warrantless wiretapping program was approved by President George W. Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. Officials from both the Bush and the Obama administrations said cooperation of the phone companies has been vital to national security and that penalizing them would jeopardize surveillance operations.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs said they would appeal to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Judge Walker's decision lets the government be the judge of its own actions, and that's a pretty dangerous precedent," said Bruce Afran, a New Jersey lawyer representing a group of phone users.

In his ruling, Walker said the legal protection Congress allowed for the telecommunications companies was unusual in immunity law, the Times said.

"It creates a retroactive immunity for past, completed acts committed by private parties acting in concert with government entities that allegedly violated constitutional rights," he wrote.

Cindy Cohn, legal director for plaintiff Electronic Frontier Foundation, said a "silver lining" was that Walker kept intact claims against the government over the wiretapping program and a suit by an Oregon charity claiming it has evidence it was a target warrantless wiretapping.